


Early Acceptance

by celli



Category: Star Trek (Reboot)
Genre: Community: fandom_stocking, Established Relationship, Family, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-06
Updated: 2010-01-06
Packaged: 2017-10-18 03:15:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/184390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/celli/pseuds/celli
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The one where Kirk and Jocelyn have a heart-to-heart.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Early Acceptance

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Saavikam77](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saavikam77/gifts).



> Written for saavikam77 for the fandom_stocking challenge. Thanks to Caro, Havoc, and Kagey for beta and cheerleading.

When Bones called Earth, it was for Joanna. His conversations with the woman he still referred to only as “my ex” (the number of syllables in “my” fluctuated depending on the amount of bourbon left in his glass) were limited to the most basic of topics--Joanna's health, Bones’s leave times, and the contents of certain letters to Santa. Anything else led to the kind of whispered shouting you did when your kid or significant other was asleep nearby (or pretending to be) and Bones stabbing people with even more hyposprays than usual for a week.

At least the one thing they never argued about was money. Jim, who had been the object of several dozen screaming matches on the topic, was first confused, then suspicious, then relieved.

He started up a conversation with Jocelyn every time they visited, partly because it kept him from showing emotion while Bones and Joanna shared one of their patented ten-minute hugs, and partly because he’d never met a brick wall he couldn’t resist.

“So, how’s work?”

“Fine.”

“I hear Joanna’s karate exhibition went well.”

“Yes.”

“Any plans for the holidays?”

“Not yet.”

Ooh, two words. Jim was tempted to tell her that the quota for inscrutable Vulcans had already been filled in his life, but he took a big drink of his sweet tea instead.

All the visits went that way, sweet tea included, which meant that Jim was even more hyper than usual. He and Joanna dragged Bones through every park, playground, tourist trap, and candy store in a three-state radius. Bones would grumble his way through it, being Bones, but Jim could tell from the way Joanna clung to him again at the other end of the visits that she knew the truth.

“Me and Joanna, we understand,” he said one night, back on the _Enterprise_ , while the gamma shift scurried around preparing to leave orbit in the morning.

“What?” Bones asked. His chest rumbled under Jim’s cheek.

“What you really mean when you complain.”

“I’m pretty sure I mean I’m complaining,” Bones said dryly, but Jim lifted his head in time to see an involuntary smile catch the edges of Bones’s mouth.

“Mm-hm,” he said, and kissed him.

He had almost resigned himself to the status quo--face it, there were only so many platonic pickup lines in the universe--until a visit shortly before Joanna’s seventeenth birthday. He was about to reach for his sweet tea when a hand clamped down on his wrist.

“Can I talk to you?” Jocelyn asked.

“W-what?”

Jocelyn had him out of his chair and in the other room before he’d processed the fact that it was happening.

“Um, how can I help you?” he asked, putting on his Captain of the Enterprise we-come-in-peace mask.

“You can do something about _this_ ,” she said, and shoved a PADD at him.

 _Joanna McCoy,_

 _We would like to congratulate you on your early acceptance to Starfleet Academy..._

“Whoa, that’s great!” Jim looked up at Jocelyn’s stony face. “...right?”

“Did you do this?” she asked. “Pull some strings for her.”

“Absolutely not. She got in on her own merits.” Honesty compelled him to add, “But I would have if she’d asked me.”

Jocelyn Darnell McCoy, a woman of dignity and refinement who deserved the antique appellation “Southern belle,” made a noise as close to a growl as Jim had ever heard from a human. He didn’t step back, but he might have shifted his weight a little.

“My daughter,” she informed him in a voice of restrained fury, “is not going into space.”

Jim’s hand twitched toward his communicator. One quick transport, and he’d be back on the _Enterprise_ , away from crazy mamas and family conflicts. Then he heard Bones and Joanna laughing in the other room, and he sighed.

Stupid love.

“Not going into space, Jocelyn? Or not going into Starfleet?”

“She’s not going onto one of those floating death traps they call a starship. How many people died at the Battle of Vulcan, in ships alone?”

“One thousand, two hundred and eight-seven,” Kirk said, “including two dozen _Enterprise_ crew members.”

She stared at him.

“It would have been worse,” he said conversationally, “but even with the cadets added to all the ships, they were still running with the equivalent of skeleton crews.”

She stared at him some more.

“You think I don’t know? You think I don’t know what can happen in space? I was _born_ out of what can happen in space. I’m the last person to tell you it’s all first contacts and interstellar touristing and strange new worlds. Sometimes you die on the strange new world. Sometimes you die in space. Starfleet creates widows and orphans, I’m not gonna lie to you.”

“But you’re up there,” Jocelyn said.

Jim shrugged helplessly. “I have to be.”

“Why? What’s up there? Planets die and people wage war.”

“And planets are born, from natural causes or sentient ingenuity; and people make peace.” Jim rubbed a hand across the back of his neck. “And there are triple sunrises on unnamed planets, and minerals on moons that cure incurable diseases, and beings to meet who challenge our ideas of who we are as humans. For some of us, it makes it worth the rest.”

“And what makes it worth it for the people left behind?”

“Ask my mother,” he said, half to himself. “No, you know what? Ask your kid. She sends her father back into space twice a year, without fail, and she still thinks space is worth it. Maybe you should ask her what she sees up there.”

“She’s too young.” Jocelyn was crying, actually crying. “She doesn’t _understand_.”

“Mama.”

They looked over to see Joanna and Bones in the doorway. Joanna looked nervous but determined--and Jim knew a determined McCoy when he saw one--and Bones had one arm still wrapped around her, a little pale but calm.

“You could have stepped in,” Jim stage-whispered.

“You were doing just fine on your own,” Bones said.

Jim looked back at Jocelyn. “Joanna understands,” he said simply, and turned on his heel. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to load up on sweet tea while the _three_ of you talk." He shot a look back at Jocelyn, who was wiping her eyes and staring at her daughter.

“Thank you,” Bones said quietly as Jim passed, and Jim stopped to briefly tangle their fingers together.

“Stupid love,” he said, and left Bones smiling as he walked away.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Transparent](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12060294) by [LadyMerlin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyMerlin/pseuds/LadyMerlin)




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